THE WOVEN COMPANY: Green Window Treatments

It is rare to find materials that rapidly restore themselves and provide extensive aesthetic range in their simplest, purest state. The Woven Company picked up on this idea nearly 25 years ago, when they first began using reeds, bamboos, grasses, woods, and palms to create window treatments with such a variety of patterns and textures that choosing one for a space is like choosing a work of art.

Bamboo is everywhere these days (grown primarily in South East Asia), so it’s makes sense that there would be enough excess bi-product from the production of bamboo flooring, veneer, and furniture to make use of. That’s just what the Nguyen Family is able to do in their efficient production facilities in South East Asia. Every last thread from the fast-growing plants are be spun into twine to create a variety of patterns. We love the company’s use of not only green, natural materials, but a well-rounded approach to the production and manufacturing of high-quality, sustainable home products.

10 thoughts on “THE WOVEN COMPANY: Green Window Treatments”

Good day!!
Allow me a short introduction. Architecture Update, a nascent venture of Economic Research India Ltd(http://www.projectsmonitor.com), is a fortnightly newspaper enabling a mode of communication for exchange of ideas and information among the architectural community in India .. A means to track changes and stay on track. An attempt to bring all the news, developments, policy decisions, events, technologies and current happenings in the AEC sector and help to stay updated.
We feature exclusive products that will change face of Architecture, Engineering and construction in the country. We find your projects very interesting and I am sure they would be iconic structures, conceived by the most talented and creative architects.
I read about the 'Green Window Treatment' from your group. This eco friendly design would defenitely intrest the architects in India. Kindly send the details of the product along with few high-resolution images, so that we can feature the same in our next issue.
Kindly inform us if this is possible.
Looking forward to your reply,
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I use Bamboo floor at home. They are a perfect alternative to hardwood floors. Also click on my name to see the link for bamboo covered tea pots. The pandas are not painted on. they are woven using colored bamboo strings.

Bamboo is a rapidly growing grass that can be harvested every year. But when the entire harvest is removed and nothing is returned to the land, fertility is used up. Unless there is some other waste product nearby that is being used as fertilizer on the bamboo fields, I don't think this is a sustainable product even though at first glance it seems like a great idea.

Piper, I am not familiar with this particular brand. Many companies sell bamboo and reed blinds. Is the difference with this company how they produce them? Or their respect for materials and the environment?
Andrew K-- One problem is that many of these types of products must be lined in order to provide privacy, and I might guess because they can be transparent, not so great with the heat control. For example, in the top photo, you can see right out. While this may not be an issue, for that particular application, in other applications, it's clearly part of the goal to provide privacy. Because light and view passes through, I would think they are not as efficient as really great products for helping with energy costs because the weave is not that tight. I am just guessing here....
So lining them might be the next idea... But alas, I have had problems in my practice with lined wovens. When I have lined them, the mechanisms do not work well or they get very heavy and clumsy. So an option is to put a second row of pleated shade behind them, or something like that.
The company may have information on how the products reduce energy costs, as (companies such as Hunter Douglas) provide this type of information. http://www.hunterdouglas.com/hdg_product_detail.jsp?id=8. They rate wovens as "Good," but that's their lowest rating.
AbbeyK
www.AbbeyK.com
www.OnInteriorDesign.com

Fabrics made from splits of bamboo (see the samples on the table, above) will have a higher UV protection rating - acting like wooden venetian blinds and actually absorbing the UV yet by their woven nature reducing the glare of the light that IS allowed to pass. I would be concerned about the grasses in AZ because they will break down under the UV much more quickly.
My primary 2nd thoughts, though, are about my cats...to keep them off the furniture, I've trained them to sisal scratching posts...which they use with gusto. They would take one sniff o' this stuff and decide the entire window treatment was theirs to destroy!

I love the photos, very enlightening.
I wonder about the performance of the bamboo in window-covering applications, however. Here in Arizona, window coverings are a crucial part of reducing energy costs and preserving furniture and floor-coverings.